Nuvi 250W...worth buying map update ?

My no longer supported Quest1 can still get us there if need be.

I also have a 2012 model Nuvi, updates for life, of course.

Lifetime map updates purchased late in 2009 for an older Nuvi that I use cost $66 on Amazon.

Geo/ATL

If you are only using it as a back-up unit, why spend the money?

But Amazon sells a lifetime for $ 66.00 it will probably also mean a SD card will be required.
Garmin's one time update is $ 49.99

http://www.amazon.com/Garmin-n%C3%BCMaps-Lifetime-America-Up...

Then there is this, probably not too kosher.
http://toronto.kijiji.ca/c-buy-and-sell-electronics-CHEAP-GA...

I have a 295w that I use for backup, email and weather reports. Without JCV or Lane assist I don't want to invest too much either. If the LM gets below $50, I will go for it.

You bring up a good point...since my Nuvi 250W is only used as backup why bother to update maps.

I'd stay clear of 3rd party reseller other than someone like Amazon.com

Load it with the Open Street Maps. Fully routable but no TTS, speed limits, lane assist or JVs, but they are free.

And perfect for a 250W. It has none of those things.

I guess it may depend on how old the maps are that are loaded into it and how much the roads have changed since those maps came out.

Good point, I also have a 250 (no W) and the maps are showing their age. A lot of recently constructed roads don't show. Battery is near shot (sharp drop in recent months) so I'm definitely not sinking the mew map cost into it when I've seen what look like better Garmin replacements at not much more than lifetime maps would cost. And I have a microSD card so I shouldn't have any space issues keeping the old maps (just in case) while using the newer. Any insight on how recent and how accurate OSM is? Without speed limit data, how accurate do the ETA calculations seem on a trip? (Currently with my 250 they are dead on except that they don't anticipate traffic or delays at traffic signals. So accurate that I'm sure the speed limit data is in there, just not displayed on a 250.)

My severely limited experience of a couple of times with an OSM shows that it seems quite updated, although I am comparing that with a 2009 Garmin map for my area, and accurate enough.

But, for my Nuvi 360, which works with text to speech, the OSM is problematic because of that text to speech component. I had a right turn to make for one "trip" and I had the OSM selected and operating vs. the Garmin map and the text to speech did not work at that turn--I learned by experience that the text to speech of the Garmin map is critical for me.

Why bother with any of this when you can get a new 40 or 50lm for $100 or so discounted.

Free is less than $100 or more. With limited funds I would rather spend the cash on food. And there are lot of advantages to being able to install alternate maps, such as the alternate topo map that I have. The same skills should apply to any similar size map, so it makes a lot of sense to be able to install and use this one that is several years newer (and I live in an area with lots of new roads) and there are some strange map errors in the area near me on Garmin maps (connections that don't exist and never did).

On the issue of OSM not working or not working well on a 3xx nuvi, I already determined that my 250 GPS doesn't have the features that conflict with OSM. So if I can get the nuvi to see it, I think it will be a great map.

I will be interested to hear your comments after you have used the OSM for a while. I have found the OSM to be up to date and accurate.

The main thing I miss compared to City Navigator is the address lookup. The OSM doesn't seem to have specific house numbers or even ranges, so the best address lookup can do is get you to the right street. So it might pick a point on that street that is miles from where you are trying to go.

If you pick the exact point of your destination from the map, or select the destination by some other method such as a saved Favorite, POI, road intersection or coordinates, the routing and navigation with OSM work well enough.

That has been my experience with OSM on the Garmin Oregon 550T. The Oregon didn't come with City Navigator and I only occasionally use it for car navigation, so it is not worth it to buy City Navigator. I am willing to live with the shortcomings of the OSM address lookup.

Downloaded it yesterday, but still can't get the 250 to see it. Started another thread to grovel for help, "Questions about OpenStreetMap and nuvi 250". Would love to hear from another 250 user or even a 2xx user.

No too concerned about not getting the street number right, I've had the Garmin 250 pick the wrong end of a street too. Best way that I have found to do that is picking the coordinates off of a map and plugging them in, but even if I just put in the street address, at least I have the street address handy to find once I get to the street.

As best as I can tell with my 250, there is a 2 gig limit on the 250 for maps, so you can't load and use the full USA OSM. You can, at best, use half of the country (east or west) as an OSM file under 2 gig in size. Swapping memory cards may also be a problem if the origin for a route is in one map but the destination in the other, I don't expect the 250 to be able to route you well that way.

Not that I'm going to buy a new map for my nuvi from Garmin at the price they want, it just would not be worth it. Far better would be to invest a little more in a new GPS with a fresh map, Or maybe it is time to use an Android tablet with GPS or even an Android phone rather than stick with Garmin units that make it so tough to resolve issues like this.

I had a lot of trouble getting the full country OSM map working on my 4 year old nuvi. But I was advised to upgrade to firmware 5.1 to get 2 maps less than 2 gig each working in the device. I used Garmin's update tool, and I'm now being told that I'm running Firmware 7.60 (which is a much larger jump than I expected). Don't have a change log that tells me what happened up to version 7.60, but I've found that with current software the nuvi now supports the 3.5 gig full USA map from OSM. And I can put an additional map on my 8 gig microSD card and switch to that when I want as well. So if anyone else is trying to get OSM maps working on a 250 or 250W (and likely other older nuvis), updating your firmware through the Garmin website is a good way to start.

Check out this link for changes.
http://www8.garmin.com/support/download_details.jsp?id=4103

@Frovingslosh: You actually have a 255W, unless you bought one of the 250Ws that had the guts of a 255W in them. Regardless, the large jump you mention is because you don't have a 250W.

For the record folks, the last firmware update for the 200W and 250W was 4.10, which allowed for a second map to be used on the device.

http://www8.garmin.com/support/download_details.jsp?id=3725

I actually have a 250, not a 250W or a 255W. But yes, it is the newer hardware, 2 gig of flash and the screen displays the round +/- zoom buttons, not the old square ones. I don't recall off the top of my head, but there were one or two features in the 255 that my 250 lacked and still lacks.

The 255 and 255W added TTS (spoken street names), a turn indicator in the upper left corner (NOT Lane Assist), and a speed limit indicator in the lower right corner.